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We are all in sales, whether we know it or not. From the telemarketer selling his product to a CEO selling her board on a succession plan, all of us have to sell at one time or another. The most successful leaders not only know how to sell products, but how to sell ideas as well.

Brand development is shifting from an advocacy marketing model (why one should buy a brand) to an ambassador model (how you can participate in the brand). Social media offers a platform that can rapidly transmit brand messaging to an audience while letting the audience participate in the message.

Selling is not an event but an ever-changing process that requires a solid strategy to achieve positive results. James Healy explains how to manage the four dynamic and interactive functions of selling and describes the skills that good salespeople need to learn in order to develop an effective selling strategy.

Citing intriguing examples from Oracle, Southwest Airlines, Walmart, Comcast, and Starbucks, Charlene Li shows us how companies can use social media tools to develop more intimate and beneficial relationships with customers.

When customers reject your price, it is often thought that the price is too high. But according to Tom Nagle, this may not be true. Price levels are only the visible "tip of the iceberg" of pricing strategy. Nagle explains that in order to get customers to pay for value, you have to do more than just set a value-based price.

The explosion of information made available by the Internet has caused a radical shift in consumer purchasing behavior. This environment lowers the barrier of entry for lesser-known brands—but also opens the door for established brands to diversify. Itamar Simonson’s research covers consumer decision making and brand evaluation, buyer behavior, and marketing management.

According to Lara Lee, intensive customer focus is the most effective means of achieving the rich pipeline of innovation that leads to continuous improvement and consistent growth. She shares examples of how she implemented this at Harley-Davidson, as well as the successes of Zipcar, Chipotle, and more.

Customer relationship management is all about keeping customers happy. But not all customers are created equal. Roger Siboni explains that the secret is in differentiating your best customers, giving them personalized service, and rewarding them for their loyalty.

Bitcoin has made its presence known. After the initial hype and volatility, a number of unanswered questions remain. Susan Athey discusses the technological innovation behind Bitcoin and its broader applications, as well as crypto-currency’s potential impact on financial systems, industries—even world economies.

Truly market-focused organizations must pursue more than a sound market strategy. Professor Hayagreeva Rao details the six levers of culture building, and explains how aligning these factors reduces employee stress and turnover, creating a self-selected, productive workforce that is in touch with the demands of potential customers.

A successful China or India strategy is likely to become a matter of survival for multinational companies. China’s GDP will catch up to that of the U.S. by 2025, predicts Professor Gupta. By 2050, GDP of both China and India will reach or surpass that of the U.S., Europe and Japan combined. Strategies that capture market share, talent, and innovation opportunities in these emerging giants necessitate understanding their unique yet complementary strengths.

Managers are under constant pressure to grow, but it is often difficult to find new avenues of growth within an existing line of business. In order to win in the marketplace, it is essential to understand which customer behaviors make and lose money for your organization. Dr. James Hollingshead offers specific tools for seeing existing markets differently and uncovering hidden opportunities for growth.

Tim Brown advocates using the three stages of “design thinking”: inspiration, ideation, and implementation to create successful innovations that are desirable to consumers, technically feasible, and viable from a business point of view.

With the ever-present need to reduce costs and boost customer loyalty, Bill Price argues that companies should challenge the need for customer service in the first place. This game-changing approach treats service as a data point of dysfunction since it is almost always needed either to fix mistakes or to resolve customer confusion.